


tether

by cirrus (themorninglark)



Series: SASO 2017 [33]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Challenge: Sports Anime Shipping Olympics | SASO 2017, Graduation day feels, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-06
Updated: 2017-08-06
Packaged: 2018-12-11 19:21:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11720862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themorninglark/pseuds/cirrus
Summary: “Someone, it seems, was trying to confess. And failed.”Osamu’s laugh is a startling thing. It is never as quiet as Shinsuke expects, always sweeter, always real.Kita in the school courtyard with a second button.





	tether

**Author's Note:**

> Written for SASO 2017 Bonus Round 5: Clue | [originally posted here](http://sportsanime.dreamwidth.org/24808.html?thread=15402984#cmt15402984)

It’s near the far wall with the overgrown vines that Shinsuke sees the glint on the ground, and when he bends down to pick it up, he is unsurprised to find that in the rush and the flurry of today, someone’s lost a button.

He straightens, turns it over in his hands. There’s a spot near the edge where it’s been rubbed to a well-used smooth brass shine, and a dent, too, where someone stepped on it in the courtyard. It’s been cleanly cut off. There’s no trace of loose threads threads trailing from behind the button, and this is too remote a corner of school for it to have been accidentally dropped.

Shinsuke glances up at the ivy, twining its way across the weathered red brick. Not quite the poetic backdrop of cherry blossoms, but close enough, he supposes, for a scene like this.

“Oh. There you are.”

Shinsuke’s gaze flicks sideways sharply. It’s not often he doesn’t hear footsteps coming, and it’s usually the same person.

“Osamu.”

Osamu walks over, hands in pockets. His collar’s unbuttoned today, and there’s an easy slouch to his shoulders. “Been looking for you. Congrats on graduating.”

“Thank you.”

“Top of the class while captaining us to Nationals… as expected of you, Kita-san.”

A smile breaks out on Osamu’s face then, a languid sunset warmth that curls around them both like the rising breeze.

“You think too much of me,” says Shinsuke, and it’s no false humility. Just their truth.

Osamu hums, keeps his proud silence for a moment.

Shinsuke doesn’t move. He doesn’t lean against the wall, or anything that would invite Osamu to linger undecorously; it is a delicate line they walk, and Shinsuke does not know where they will go from here. He does not ask, either, _where is Atsumu_.

He knows Osamu has his ways of shaking Atsumu off when he does not want him around. He knows this is one of those times, for Osamu makes a point of lingering, in spite of everything.

He looks down at the button in Shinsuke’s palm, and raises his eyebrows. “Is that a second button?”

Shinsuke doesn’t miss the way Osamu’s eyes dart to his _gakuran_ , take in the second button still securely fastened by his heart.

“I picked it up here,” says Shinsuke. He holds it up against the sky, watches the early evening light glow pink in its reflection. “Someone, it seems, was trying to confess. And failed.”

Osamu’s laugh is a startling thing. It is never as quiet as Shinsuke expects, always sweeter, always real.

“So pessimistic, Kita-san—”

“Realistic,” Shinsuke murmurs.

“Well. Maybe it went well, and they decided they didn’t need cheesy things like _second buttons_ ,” he remarks, digging one heel into the ground as he holds Shinsuke’s gaze steady.

Shinsuke lets out a measured breath.

“Maybe,” he concurs. “It _is_ very… cheesy.”

“Mmm. Not your style, I’d say. Or mine.”

Shinsuke lowers his arm, turns his fist over, and pauses for a moment before he opens it. The button falls. They both watch as it lands on the ground with a soft clatter, tumbles lightly across the courtyard and disappears into a crack in the tile, and Shinsuke finds a smile to match Osamu’s.

“Not at all,” he agrees, and wonders when all their rejected clichés caught up with them like this, with Osamu close enough for their shadows to touch.


End file.
